New Gear From Campy

Campagnolo's New Electronic Power Shift Groupset

matt phillips

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Sicily (Bicycling.com) — Campagnolo officially unveiled its production electronic shifting groups, a project that began in 1992 as an 8-speed group. Over the years, Campy has been asked many times, "When can we buy your electric group?"

Campagnolo provided many reasons for the extraordinarily long development process: the technology wasn't available to support its vision; it wanted the group to be perfect; its racers asked for improved performance; it kept adding speeds to its mechanical groups and so the electronic group had to be on par.

Perhaps the most revelatory: In 2005 the group was ready to be put into production but a freak occurrence stopped everything. Cars with team bikes were driving home from the Giro d'Italia and encountered a powerful rainstorm. The combination of the sheer volume of water and the 150kph speed the cars were traveling at was enough to drive water into the electronics. The systems quit. And even though the systems began working again a day or so later, Campy decided it needed to rework the sealing.

As you might imagine, Campy claims the production EPS system is waterproof—even team MoviStar mechanics’ pressure washers didn't breach the seals. (The team raced pre-production EPS systems for the whole 2011 season.)

When the group finally gets into people’s hands, it will be 2012, 20 years after the project began. No other product in modern memory has had as long a development. And though it began its road to electronics well before Shimano, Campagnolo enters a market in which its Japanese competitor has laid the groundwork.

The market is still dominated by mechanical shifting, but people have heard of electronic shifting. They may have touched it, or one of their buddies has it. Maybe they know it took all three spots on the Tour de France podium this year.

Electric shifting is not a mysterious novelty that Campy needs to explain: It just needs to prove its stuff was worth waiting for. Beyond the expected claims of "benchmark performance" and "reliability in any condition," there were these two nuggets: EPS will shift under higher torque loads, and it will shift faster than its mechanical brethren.

Perhaps the biggest surprise in the unveiling was that the company is hitting the market with two new groups out of the gate: Super Record 11 EPS (Electric Power Shift) and Record 11 EPS. Though prices have not been set yet, the company says the latter will be priced on par with Shimano's Dura Ace Di2 (about $4,000 for a complete group); Super Record EPS, naturally, will be more expensive. Availability: It'll probably be spring 2012 before you can get your hands on it. Like Shimano's Di2, the EPS group's cranks, brakes, chains and cassettes are shared with their mechanical siblings.

Compared to the mechanical groups, taking the electric-shifting route incurs a weight penalty, a bit over 200 grams, according to Campy's claimed weights. Super Record EPS comes in at 2,098 grams versus 1,875 for mechanical. Record EPS tips the scales at 2,184 grams versus 1,974. Both are lighter than Dura Ace Di2, the company claims.

In fact, if Campy's weights are accurate, Record EPS may be lighter than Dura Ace mechanical. It's interesting, however, that Shimano's Di2 penalty—DA Di2 versus DA mechanical; Ultegra Di2 versus Ultegra mechanical—is less than 100 grams. Campy's EPS penalty is more than 200.

The lever layout is the same as Campagnolo's mechanical groups—one lever, one function. One lever upshifts, one lever downshifts, and one lever brakes. A somewhat significant update: The position of the thumb lever (Campy calls it "Lever 2") has been lowered, so it's easier to actuate from the drops. Unlike Shimano's electric shifting, where every cog requires an individual push of the lever, you can shift all the way up or down the entire cassette simply by holding the lever.